Handouts are available below

Big Idea

Are you looking for an easy and engaging activity to introduce CER next year? Here’s one you can try – and to add a bit of fun, you’ll be working with a colleague and collecting some summer vacation artifacts over the summer to use as part of a show-and-tell for this CER activity. Don’t worry, it won’t take up much time – no different than keeping a small summer memory box.

Episode Notes

• CER is a framework to help students write an argument, which is a skill that is taught in our curriculum (under “Communicating” in the BC Science curriculum and under Science and Engineering Practices in the NGSS). Thus, for a CER intro activity, let’s have our students engage in argument – but, let’s make it easy for them to come up with one.

• For this CER intro activity, get a colleague to collect 5-7 unique artifacts over the summer that would paint a picture of what they did during their summer break. This could be a ticket stub to a movie, a seashell from the beach, a sweater they knit – you get the idea. And, you should do the same during your vacation – collect unique 5-7 artifacts over the summer as well.

• When you do your intro class to CER, lay out all the artifacts that you and your colleague have collected and tell students where the artifacts are from. Then, tell your students to use CER to structure their argument to this question: Which teacher – Teacher A or Teacher B – had the better summer vacation?

Thanks for watching, and let’s talk science education again soon.

Resources

Handout(s): Ep60 Handouts – One CER Summer Homework Assignment for Teachers

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